Pruebas de actitudes y motivaciones : a Spanish attitudes and motivation test battery for students of English as a second language

The relationship between students’ attitudes and motivation and second language achievement has been explored by the Language Research Group of the University of Western Ontario, Canada for over twenty years. Researchers there produced the Attitudes and Motivation Test Battery (AMTB), an instrument which assesses such a relationship. The Pruebas de Actitudes y Motivaciones (PAM) is a conceptually translated version of the AMTB; it is designed to be used with Hispanic students learning English as a second language (ESL). Ninety-six seventh, eighth and ninth grade Dade County Public School students studying ESL served as subjects. The first objective of this study was to assess the construct validity of the PAM; the second objective was to assess its reliability. These objectives were chosen since they provide evidence of the standards of validity and reliability essential in the development of any testing instrument. Objective three, to construct a local normative sample, was undertaken in order to produce a more specific account of the characteristics found in the normative population. Students sampled showed a high degree of motivation to learn English and good attitudes towards Americans. The PAM, although exhibiting good reliability coefficients, did not exhibit significant construct validity. The socio-cultural make-up of the students, who were primarily recent Cuban entrants, was proposed as the reason for the inconsistency of findings between the local and Canadian samples